Category Archives: Vampire Diaries

Here we are at the end of October, and it feels like this entire month has been sucked into a black hole. What have I been up to? A lot, actually, thanks for asking. I took three trips to the coast, scouting book locations and familiarizing myself with the area well enough to write about it, hopefully. I released another Vampire Diaries novel under the Kindle Worlds label, titled Dark Side of the Moon. And finally, I’ve completed the first draft for The Company of Lies, and the edits are going well. I’m hoping to have The Company of Lies out some time in November, we’ll see how long the edits take to finish and I should have a cover reveal soonish.

A lot of people have asked me – when is the next Forged Bloodlines book coming out? It’s hard to pinpoint exactly with the holidays coming up, especially because my oldest is coming home for a visit and I want to be able to do family things without a tight deadline over my head. So, when I say “early 2015″ I’m aiming for sometime in January, but the reality might be February if too many family commitments take precedence.

In looking to 2015, I’ve drawn up a very rough sketch of my writing plans for the year, which are of course, subject to change.

Early 2015 – Tempt Me When the Sun Goes Down
Spring – The Company of Death, the final book in The Company series.
Early Summer – Book 10 of Forged Bloodlines
Late Summer – A sequel to my shifter book, Moonsong, where we follow Scarlett out into the world.
Fall – Book 11 of Forged Bloodlines
End of 2015 – Let Sleeping Ghosts Lie, a stand alone ghost story.

Like I said, this could totally change. The Company might get suddenly popular and I could write Cady adventures ’til the cows come home, or one of the other projects on my back burner could fight its way to the front of the line. Because there are SO MANY IDEAS waiting for their turn!

Let’s hear from you guys. If you could hack into my robot brain, what writing order would you set for me?

I’m very excited to be part of Amazon’s new venture, and have published my story The Vampire Diaries: Tabula Rasa through the Kindle Worlds program. This lets authors “borrow” the characters from specific shows they’ve obtained permission from and spin their own realities. The authors retain ownership of any new characters they bring to the table, but we can build on each other’s worlds and the show could even decide to use our ideas if they like it enough.

I’m giving it a shot to see how it pans out, mostly to try and reach new readers, and also just because I love, love, love writing Damon in The Vampire Diaries. It’s a fun change to play in their world every now and again instead of my own, and with Tabula Rasa in particular, I had a lot of fun winking at established canon through my own eyes since it’s an amnesia story, the name inspired by one of my favorite episodes of Buffy.

Here is the blurb:

Tabula Rasa means blank slate, hence a perfect name for a fic about amnesia. The premise is this: Elena, Katherine, Caroline, Bonnie, Damon, Stefan, & Mason all wake to find themselves trapped in an abandoned warehouse with complete amnesia. Stripped of their past histories and all the baggage that comes with it, how will they interact with each other? Who can be trusted? And who has betrayal in their heart? Will we end up with canon pairings? Or will other true feelings be revealed? This story takes place after episode 2.5 Kill or be Killed, going completely AU after that.

I was going to post about finishing Nine Steps to Sara when it struck me, it’s not really an ending; it’s a beginning. Sure, I’m done laboring over it, but it’s really the beginning of the book’s life now that it’ll be available for public consumption in the next few days. Huh.

Okay, wasn’t meaning to get all philosophical on you guys, really just reporting that I’m days away from publishing Nine Steps to Sara and starting in on the sequel to Wake Me, Meet Me When the Sun Goes Down. I’ve pretty much got the plot all laid out and I can’t wait to get started!!! I had a lot of fun re-reading Wake Me and getting back into Anja’s head.

I couldn’t resist getting in a little fanfiction oneshot in there before I get started on the new book though, so I posted a Vampire Diaries Delena fic Hate to Love You. Holy crap I missed writing for those guys! It’s so tempting not to take them on another epic adventure, but I’m trying to stick to my timetable and still get another two books written this year.

The first book of my new vampire series is now available for sale on Amazon.com and BarnesAndNoble.com! It’s out as an e-book for $3.99 but you don’t have to have a Kindle or Nook to read it, they have free downloadable apps so you can read it on your PC, or even your phone. It’ll be available in print as well in a couple of weeks through Amazon.

I wrote this one during November for NaNoWriMo and I’m super happy about how it came out and how the characters evolved. You know me and taking breaks are non-mixy things, so I’m currently working on the outline for Mercy for the Damned, due out next spring. My Vampire Diaries fanfic idea fell flat after I got the first chapter done, so I’ve decided to put that on hold and wait for better inspiration while I continue to work on Mercy and the Push fanfic (which doesn’t have many readers, but I’m loving the characters there!).

In the meantime, Happy Holidays to everyone who celebrates them, and don’t worry, it’ll all be over soon to those of you who don’t.

Thanks to everyone who voted on cover art for Wake Me When the Sun Goes Down, it came in at 14 for the one on the left, and 9 for the one on the right, counting votes offsite. I kind of agree, the one on the left looks more suited to Paranormal Romance even though the one on the right is probably cleaner when shrunk down. So, I’ll be using the one on the left, and hopefully it’ll be up and available for sale in the next few days. Tracy was our winner for a free copy of a book and she chose The Touch. Congratulations Tracy, I’ll send it out tonight.

I’ll take a break for a couple of weeks for the holidays before I get into serious plotting for The Fallen sequel, Mercy for the Damned, due out next spring. In the meantime, I’ve started a couple of fanfictions. One for the movie Push called Someone to Watch Over Me. If you’ve never seen the movie before, I recommend it, it’s set in a world where people have psychic abilities and a government agency is chasing after them. Chris Evans is fantastic in it, and he helped inspire my main guy Bishop in Wake Me.

I’m also working on another Vampire Diaries one where Damon lives next door to Elena while she’s in college on the west coast. It’s completely AU and nobody knows that vampires exist, should be fun.

Wouldn’t it be great if we could take the whole week off for Thanksgiving like my kids do from school now? I could laze around, drinking cocoa, wrapping X-mas presents, watching cheesy Hallmark movies on TV, getting to some writing when I felt like it… on second thought, that’s not such a hot idea after all. For whatever reason, I need the stress of a deadline to help me produce, and so far so good this month, it’s Day 21 of NaNoWriMo and I’m up to about 62,000 words of my new vampire novel, Wake Me When the Sun Goes Down.

I just finished the final update of my Vampire Diaries Fanfic, Dark Side of the Moon and that always gets me to thinking about starting something new. I can’t wait to start the next one, but it’ll have to wait a few weeks I think until the novel is edited and ready to go. I might even take a break and get to some reading I’ve been looking forward to (Got Storm Chaser by Mark R. Hunter already downloaded to my Nook and ready to go!) before I start the next book in The Fallen series.

I’m looking forward to some turkey with family and friends this week. I always make the same delicious recipe with lemons, rosemary and dijon mustard. (I know it sounds a little weird, but it makes the best gravy!) I’ve just about got my holiday shopping done too except for some online purchases, how about you guys? Are you going to brave the Black Friday deals or settle in with some cocoa and hit the online sales?